US judge slashes $80 million award in Monsanto cancer case

This is an archived article and the information in the article may be outdated. Please look at the time stamp on the story to see when it was last updated.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A U.S. judge lowered a jury’s damage award from $80 million to $25 million for a California cancer victim who used Monsanto’s Roundup weed-killer.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports Monday that U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria said he was required to reduce the punitive damage award because it went beyond constitutional limits set by the U.S. Supreme Court.

In March, a jury found that glyphosate was a likely cause of 70-year-old Edwin Hardeman’s diagnosis of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

Jurors awarded him $200,000 for economic losses, $3 million for past pain and suffering, another $2 million for emotional distress in his future years, and $75 million in punitive damages. Hardeman’s cancer is in remission.

Chhabria refused Friday to overturn the jury’s verdict that Monsanto’s product was a likely cause of Hardeman’s cancer.

___

Information from: San Francisco Chronicle, http://www.sfgate.com

Copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.